New preprint from us! 🦠 Clinical metagenomics is great for sequencing pathogens directly from patient samples but for some protocols sensitivity for RNA viruses lags behind bacteria & fungi. We have shown why, and how to fix it. www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...

Library preparation strategy critically impacts RNA virus sensitivity in clinical metagenomics

Clinical metagenomics uses sequencing for culture-independent identification of pathogens directly from clinical specimens. While a number of protocols claim to be pathogen agnostic, sensitivity for R...

medrxiv.org

Registration is now open for the first UK Virome Forum meeting! 📍 Advanced Research Centre (ARC), University of Glasgow 🗓️ 5-6 Oct 2026 🦠 Animal, human and environmental viromics For more info, including speakers, check bit.ly/ukvf-2026 or @ukvf.bsky.social Register for free: tinyurl.com/yhnartn5

UKVF-2026

The UK Virome Forum will bring together researchers from across the UK using genomic approaches to study viromes, with a particular focus on whole-virome analyses, viral ecology, and evolution beyond ...

bit.ly

📢 Registration is now open for the first UK Virome Forum meeting! This two-day event will bring together UK-based researchers using genomic approaches to study viromes. Whether you are investigating viral communities in soil 🌱, the human gut 🦠, or whales 🐋, this is your space!

Looking forward to hosting the UK viral community... community (🤦) in Glasgow in October! Further details, website and registration link to follow shortly! Keep an eye on our Bluesky for details 👀 🦠

UKVF.bsky.social@ukvf.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Big news for the virome research community!  We are thrilled to announce the first-ever UK Virome Forum (UKVF) in-person event! Whether you're a PhD student, an ECR, or a PI working in virome-related research, this is your space to connect and collaborate.

Great to share my PhD work with the marine mammal folks at the European Cetacean Society meeting last week! 🐳 A really welcoming meeting - hope I get to do more marine mammal research so I can come back!🤞 If you haven't seen it already, paper published now at: doi.org/10.1111/mec.... #ECS2026

🌊 How do viruses circulate in marine mammals? New research from @matt-arnold-bio.bsky.social & colleagues explores viral communities across 15 species in Scotland, identifying 120+ viruses. Younger animals carry more, and sharing between species is common. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Drivers of Viral Diversity and Sharing in Marine Mammals

Knowledge of viral infection in marine mammals, a group severely threatened by human activity, is largely limited to the pathology and epidemiology of few endemic viruses. The recent emergence in mar...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Want to work on viral community ecology and virus genomics? 🔎 🧬 🦠 Come and work with us at RVC! Applications for a 0.5 FTE lab technician role now open, suitable for someone with lab experience and a relevant BSc/MSc. jobs.rvc.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

Job Opportunity at the RVC: Research Assistant in Virus Genomics

We are seeking a part-time Research Assistant (0.5 FTE) to join the Genomics for Animal and Plant Disease Consortium (GAP-DC2), co-led at RVC. The roleYou will support the development and optimisation...

jobs.rvc.ac.uk

Wondering what happens if a seal sneezes on a whale? We were! 🦭🤧🐋 We sequenced viromes from 16 species of marine mammals stranded in Scotland. Of >100 viruses detected, ~10% appeared in multiple species (one in both seals & cetaceans!), mirroring known interspecies interactions in Scottish waters.

Excited to share my first paper! Co-circulating viruses in bats show diverse spatial movement patterns, perhaps due to different infection biology. Not all viruses move like their hosts, or like other viruses; Use them for inference with awareness and care!🧪 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Virus‐Dependent Geographic Structure of Co‐Circulating Viruses in a Single Bat Species

Understanding the spatial spread of viruses within wildlife populations is often a key component of disease management efforts. Viral spread is likely constrained by host ecology, but inter-virus dif...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

5 more dairy cows tested positive for #H5N1 #birdflu antibodies on the Dutch farm where a previous cow tested positive. No surprise that if 1 was positive, others would be too. This dairy farm is the first outside the US to report H5N1 transmission. www-melkvee-nl.translate.goog/artikel/1450...

Screening melkveebedrijf brengt nog vijf koeien met antistoffen tegen vogelgriep aan het licht

Op een melkveebedrijf in Noardeast-Fryslân zijn na screening vijf koeien met antistoffen tegen vogelgriep gevonden, maar er is geen actief virus aangetoond. Minister Wiersma verwacht volgende week een...

www-melkvee-nl.translate.goog

New preprint! We had a look at the codon and dinucleotide usage of rabies clades that circulate in specific host species, and found some interesting differences, particularly between carnivore- and bat-associated clades 👀 Coauthors on bluesky: @jdushoff.bsky.social @matt-arnold-bio.bsky.social

Differences in codon usage between host-species-specific rabies virus clades are driven by UpA and purine content

Viral genes sometimes use certain codons more than others due to their nucleotide content, translational efficiency, and selection pressure from the host immune system. The rabies virus (RABV) is a ne...

biorxiv.org

Luckily had a few minutes to do some stakeholder engagement before my talk at the @nhm.org today for the 1st birthday of @lien-london.bsky.social 🐋🐬 Thanks so much David, @roryjgibb.bsky.social and @jraghwani.bsky.social for organising and having me along. Looking forward to the next meeting!

Alongside other swingeing cuts to the CDC, Trump administration seems to be targeting EID journal 🫣 www.science.org/content/arti...

Trump administration targets academic journals with attorney letter, proposed funding cuts

Budget plan would kill two CDC journals, while U.S. prosecutor accuses some nongovernmental publications of being “partisans”

science.org

New paper! We estimated the reproductive timing of the critically endangered #flapperskate by making use of a pre-existing #citizenscience photo ID database 📸 with @davemarinebio.glasgow.ac.uk @jathorburn.bsky.social Paper ⏩ doi.org/10.1111/jfb.... & summary below ⏬

We (@SafeguardingResearch) need urgent help with archiving websites & datasets from NOAA: https://forum.safeguar.de/t/noaa-all-services-urgent/569 If you can contribute, please consider doing so. #NOAA #SafeguardingResearch #Data #Weather

NOAA all services (URGENT)

Services for NOAA will be going offline as soon as tomorrow night. (april 4th) Things affected to include: Claimed: research.noaa.gov epic.noaa.gov adp.noaa.gov ci.noaa.gov oeab.noaa.gov orta.research.noaa.gov testbeds.noaa.gov qosao.noaa.gov oss.research.noaa.gov eeo.oar.noaa.gov globalocean.noaa.gov cpo.noaa.gov seagrant.noaa.gov researchprojects.noaa.gov pier.seagrant.noaa.gov drought.gov noaa’s internet proving groundviz.pmel.noaa.gov global systems laboratory’s DESI 3....

forum.safeguar.de

A sunny first day in my new job at @royalvetcollege.bsky.social 🌞 I'll be here for the next couple of years working with @sarah-c-hill.bsky.social, @jraghwani.bsky.social, using (meta)genomic to understand viruses of wild and kept animals 🦠 🐟 weird fish viruses, here I come!

🎉PhDone!!*🎉 This week marks the end of 4 fab years at the University of Glasgow. Feel very fortunate to have worked with so many excellent people in @sbohvm.gla.ac.uk and @cvrinfo.bsky.social Papers on marine mammal viruses and modelling of host tropism incoming! 🐋 🦠 🦭 🧬 *apart from corrections 🙃